


A Fresh Poison Each Week

by IncognitoDuck11



Category: Pretty Little Liars
Genre: F/F, Gore, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Sex, Murder, Murder-Suicide, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-05
Updated: 2020-09-05
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:48:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,169
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26302195
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IncognitoDuck11/pseuds/IncognitoDuck11
Summary: "Secrets keep us close," mocked Aria, kicking at Alison's freshly dug grave with the toe of her boot. She glanced over at Spencer, who was still keeping a white-knuckled grip on the shovel. "Right, Spence?"An AU in which Spencer is the killer and Aria is -A. One-shot.
Relationships: Spencer Hastings/Aria Montgomery
Comments: 8
Kudos: 16





	A Fresh Poison Each Week

**Author's Note:**

> Howdy there, folks! It's officially September, so that means we're one month closer to Halloween! I got put in a mood to write something dark after listening to a slowed version of Take Me to Church, and this is what happened. Everybody needs a little more dark!Sparia in their lives, I reckon.
> 
> Trigger Warnings: Gore. Non-con. Suicide. Tread lightly.

_My lover's got humor_

_She's the giggle at a funeral._

-.-.-.-

"Ali?"

Spencer didn't react to the quiet voice, too focused on scrubbing at her face with the heels of her hands. It wasn't working—the blood wasn't coming off, she was only succeeding in smearing it around. The shovel lay in the dirt beside where she stood, its blade coated in a viscous layer of blood and brain matter. All she could smell was iron and damp earth, and she remembered that, for a moment, as momentum dragged the shovel blade down down down, the night creatures had ceased their chatter as if in respect. Whether it was respect for Alison's impending departure or respect for Spencer being the one responsible for it, she'd never know. What she did know was that the world did continue to turn without Alison DiLaurentis. The eyes of raccoons glinted in the brush, thunder cracked, the wind blew in a harsh whistle, and the specks of blood on her face were drying quickly. Alison wasn't the center of the universe, but Spencer had reminded her of that one tiny truth with the most enormously unforgivable act.

The first swing had been clumsy, the flat of the blade knocking against the blonde's skull, forcing her to halt her desperate crawl among the leaves. Spencer wasn't sure if that single blow had been enough to kill her, so she adjusted her grip on the shovel and lifted it in front of her before bringing it down like planting a flag in the dirt, claiming the land as her own. And in the brief second that something sinister took over, she smiled, proud of herself for kicking Ali off her throne once and for all. It reminded her of wolves, a muzzle splashed with crimson as beta bit into alpha's neck and took over the pack.

_Game over, Alison. I win._

Her sick glee lasted only until she yanked the shovel out of Alison's head, and then she was being ruled by a macabre fascination of the dark red and gray ooze leaking from the opening she'd made in her friend's skull. She'd seen pictures of the human skull, watched graphic brain surgeries on TV, but there was something different about this version of the organ. It was messy in an almost beautiful way, soaking into the dirt and feeding the plants, stubbornly clinging to perfect strands of blonde hair.

Absently, she dropped the spade, blinked, vaguely registered the warm blood on her face, and then she was back. And utterly terrified. More for her future than what it showed about herself that she could do something like this. She didn't really care if she was a monster, felt numb to the idea, really, but she definitely cared about spending the rest of her life in an orange jumpsuit. She knew that, logically, the next step was to bury the body, get rid of any evidence, make up a cover story. But the blood on her face was an irritating presence, so she started rubbing at it.

That's where she was when a hand rested gently against her arm, and she almost jumped into the nearest tree.

"Hey… Spence? You okay?"

Spencer swung around to face Aria, and instantly she felt a pang of remorse when she realized what she had to do next. _No witnesses._ Her eyes darted to the shovel, muscles stretching into action, but Aria was faster. Just as Spencer's hand wrapped around the handle, Aria's foot was slamming it back into the dirt, crushing her fingers in the process. Spencer choked on a scream, and then a sob, dropped to her knees, and suddenly she was crying. But it had nothing to do with her fingers still being painfully pinned underneath the shovel handle.

"Please don't tell anybody. I didn't mean to, Aria, I swear to God! It was an accident," sobbed Spencer, squeezing her eyes shut instead of looking up at Aria. She couldn't handle the horror in her eyes, the look that would confirm her life sentence. "Look, okay, I'll do anything, just please don't tell!"

"Spencer, look at me."

Reluctantly, Spencer looked at her, confused until she saw how flat and unaffected Aria's expression was. She sniffled. Did that mean…?

"Your secret's safe with me," said Aria, the corners of her lips tilting into a smile that didn't reach her eyes. It was jarring, because Aria was smiling when their best friend's mangled body laid not six feet away. "Actually, I have a confession to make."

Aria's eyes, usually such a warm and inviting hazel, were nearly black, cold and shadowed and swirling with something that made Spencer's skin crawl. Her voice trembled as she spoke, suddenly feeling awfully uneasy in the petite brunette's presence. "What… what is it?"

"I've been giving Ali a taste of her own medicine for almost a year now. Sending her little anonymous messages, which some might call death threats, you know, but I see them as acts of justice. Plain and simple. I didn't think I'd ever actually kill her, but now that she's dead, I'm regretting not beating you to it."

"Death threats?" Spencer repeated, Aria's words taking their time to sink in. "You've been threatening her?"

Aria rolled her eyes. She still didn't take her foot off the shovel. "Don't act like it's some big sin, Spencer, you just split her head open."

"I'm not, I… I'm actually impressed. You were fighting back this whole time. Anonymously, but still."

"Sometimes you have to hide. And sometimes that's in plain sight." Aria grinned. "I signed the messages with just a single letter A. A for anonymous–"

"A for Aria," chimed Spencer, her own grin rising on her face.

"A for Alison," the other girl corrected. "Gotta give her some credit for the monster she created. Or monsters, I guess."

Spencer was saved.

* * *

_Knows everybody's disapproval_

_I should've worshipped her sooner._

-.-.-.-

"Secrets keep us close," mocked Aria, kicking at Alison's freshly dug grave with the toe of her boot. She glanced over at Spencer, who was still keeping a white-knuckled grip on the shovel. "Right, Spence?"

Spencer tried to catch her breath, started picking the dirt out from under her fingernails. She felt almost light-headed, but it had little to do with the physical exertion of burying a body. No, it was quite simply a mix of the rush of power and the clarity of an adderall high that was doing this to her. She'd never experienced anything like it in her life. And Aria's wolfish gaze bore into her like she knew exactly what she was thinking, like she could read Spencer's drug-addled mind. Like she knew exactly what Spencer wanted—what she needed.

She didn't even think about it. Her heart was galloping in her chest as she strode across their ex-best friend's grave and cupped a hand around the back of Aria's neck. The kiss was fiery, smothering in all the right ways, and Aria responded eagerly, slipping her tongue into Spencer's mouth and looping her arms around her neck, tugging her impossibly closer. Aria dragged her down, forced her to stoop, stole her breath.

But in the muck of their mutual sin, there was euphoria.

And Spencer wanted to throw herself down at that altar.

She couldn't breathe.

Aria broke away from her, but only pulled so far back. She was still so close that she was out of focus, but Spencer could see that her pupils were big, and feel that her breath was warm. It stirred something low in her stomach, made her nerve endings crackle like live wires. She wanted to drown in this feeling.

"Secrets keep us close," she repeated, her voice a whisper that was lost in the wailing gusts of wind around them. But Aria heard it.

Aria was her only witness.

Aria knew her dirtiest, darkest secret. And her eyes said it all:

She'd take it to her grave.

* * *

_If the heavens ever did speak_

_She's the last true mouthpiece._

-.-.-.-

"Come on, Spence, admit it," said Aria. "You love it. You love the hoodie."

Spencer stared into the mirror, trying to pin herself down. The hoodie did fit well. Excellently, really. It was a practical choice, too, for stealth. For spying. For terrorizing. She looked like some harbinger of death, cloaked in black like this. Which, really, she was. "I like it," she agreed. "I do."

Aria beamed at her like they were saying their wedding vows. "Good. Because I've got a job for you to do."

She crossed the dingy motel room in languid strides, coming up behind Spencer to wrap her arms around her waist. Her chin tucked against Spencer's shoulder, and Spencer held her gaze in the mirror.

"Go check on our old friends, see what they're both up to." Aria's arms tightened around her, but she smiled innocently. "Take lots of pictures; this place could use some more decoration."

They weren't innocent. God, they were the furthest thing from innocent. This lair was the manifestation of all things wrong and twisted. It was a manifesto of the moral perversion that brought them together, a record of every dark thought and selfish wile. Masks and dolls and props were on display. There were neatly organized filing cabinets bearing all the proof a girl could want when blackmailing her friends. And the walls were papered in newspaper articles, obituaries, letters, and candid photographs. Information on every red-handed soul in Rosewood was at their fingertips. It was a violation of privacy. It was stalking. It was extortion. It was one big plot to cover up a murder.

It was more than a game.

It was absolute control.

Spencer really did love it.

"I'm on it," she said, and Aria slipped something into her hoodie pocket.

"Meet me back here in six hours," Aria told her, pecking a kiss on her cheek. Then she was sweeping out the door into the pitch black of night, clad in her own shadowy disguise.

Spencer reached into her pocket and pulled out an orange prescription bottle, shook it to hear one of her favorite sounds in the world: an abundance of pills. Which meant an abundance of focus, total submersion in her task. This drug brought out the monster in her, turned her into the omnipresent entity that her friends called 'A'.

Unscrewing the cap, she popped a couple pills and swallowed them dry. Closed her eyes as they scraped down her esophagus. Blew out a deep breath.

Pulled her hood up.

That way, she finally recognized herself in the mirror.

* * *

_Every Sunday's getting more bleak_

_A fresh poison each week._

_We were born sick_

_You heard them say it._

-.-.-.-

"You can't do this anymore? What the fuck is that supposed to mean?"

Spencer flinched at the acid in Aria's tone, but she didn't shrink away. Her hands were shaking, her heartbeat thumping at an irregular pace. She just wanted to lie down. "It means I'm done."

"No." The shorter girl rounded on her, jabbing an accusatory finger into her chest. "You don't have a choice in this, Spencer. You made your bed and you're going to lie in it."

She shoved Aria's hand away. "It's too much, Aria," she explained, her voice rising an octave without her permission. "We're going to get caught if we keep this up. We need to lay low."

Suddenly, the walls felt like they were closing in on her, paranoia gnawing at her mind like a disease. They weren't in the lair but the room beside it, and this one was empty. It was normal. It had a bed and a desk and it held none of the evidence against them. Spencer usually felt safe in this room, but Aria was in that damn black hoodie, apparently just to remind her of exactly what she'd done. What they did together.

Aria scowled. "I'm not finished with this."

"Well I am. And if that means that you and I are finished, too, then–"

Her head snapped suddenly to the side, pain blossoming across her cheekbone. It startled her so much that she couldn't recover before Aria roughly grabbed her by the chin, yanking her head around.

"I'm not finished with you, either," hissed her lover, and Spencer's heart started to pound in the worst of ways. Her stomach roiled with nausea when she saw the cruel, dark look in Aria's eyes. "I know everything about you, Spencer. I'll ruin you, if you turn your back on me now."

"Aria…?" Spencer hated how her own voice sounded in that moment. Naive, stupidly confused, backstabbed, like a child. Aria's fingernails were digging into her skin, painfully. "You—you're hurting me."

"You're hurting me," Aria mimicked in a snotty, nasty tone, landing another violent slap against the side of Spencer's head.

This one knocked her off balance, striking too close to her ear, and a lopsided ringing started up. She was reeling off balance and practically deaf as Aria's hand locked around her throat and shoved her easily backward. Her back hit the bed and then Aria was on top of her, straddling her waist, pinning her down. She was surprisingly heavy for someone so small.

"Is that what Ali said just before you bashed her skull in?"

"Aria, stop–" she tried to say, but Aria started hitting her, over and over again, with an open hand, her rings like brass knuckles as they slammed into Spencer's face. Those would leave bruises, she was certain of it. Spencer tried shoving her off to no avail, too disoriented by the rain of blows to really do anything. She gave up and tried to shield herself instead.

Without warning, Aria ceased her assault and knotted a fist in her hair, and Spencer cried out as she yanked on it. She leaned in, her breath unpleasantly damp and sickeningly hot. Spencer squeezed her eyes shut, trembling.

" _I own you_."

Then Aria slid off of her, holding the key to the cage of her guilt, her paranoia, her despair. Dangling it in front of her, just out of reach.

_I own you I own you I own you_

Spencer's head was spinning.

* * *

_My church offers no absolutes_

_She tells me worship in the bedroom._

_The only heaven I'll be sent to_

_Is when I'm alone with you._

-.-.-.-

"I love you," Aria told her.

 _I own you_ , was what Spencer heard. It bounced around her skull, constantly nagging at her. She couldn't turn it off.

Aria unbuttoned her shirt, greedily tugged her pants down over her hips, and Spencer let her. She knew what would happen if she didn't. She knew exactly what Aria would say.

_I own you. I own you. I own you._

When Aria kissed her neck, it felt like a warning, like a promise. Like _I could crush your windpipe with my teeth, if I decided to_.

_I own you I own you I own you_

Aria on top of her. Aria's hands groping her chest. Aria pushing her knees apart, pinning them to the mattress. Aria making her writhe in abject pleasure.

_IownyouIownyouIownyou_

Spencer dug her fingernails into Aria's back, clawing—no, tearing at the thin, vulnerable flesh. She wanted to mark her. She wanted to make her bleed. In response, Aria only applied more pressure to her throat.

She shuddered through her climax, surrendered to the raw ecstasy of it, forgot just how much power Aria really had over her. She forgot, just for those few long seconds of euphoria. She pretended that they were still on the same side, bound together by fate. Lovers against the world. She pretended that secrets _don't_ corrode everything they touch, especially not one this massive. It was harmless. They were fine.

_I made you, Spencer._

_Really, Ali?_

* * *

_I was born sick_

_But I love it_

_Command me to be well._

-.-.-.-

"You're a fucking liability," Aria growled, her muscles shaking as she tried to force the blade down, into Spencer's neck.

Spencer held onto her wrist, holding her back, not giving her an inch. Adrenaline had them matched in strength, an advantage that Ali never had. At least not before Spencer had first hit her. By then it was too late. By then she was on the ground, bleeding, groaning, about to be put down like a rabid animal. Golden hair and startled azure eyes and that stupid yellow top, but all Spencer saw was red. Blood. Rage. All Spencer felt was vindication, triumph, as she made sure that Alison DiLaurentis wouldn't be around for the next sunrise.

She wondered if this was the same desperation that Ali felt, struggling to hang onto her life just before somebody cut it short. Aria was trying to cut hers short. Aria was trying to kill her.

Acting on instinct alone, Spencer reached one hand up and grabbed Aria's hair, yanked on it so hard that she thought she might have pulled some up by the root. Aria screamed, her grip on the knife slackening, and Spencer threw her to the side. She redirected the point of the blade as she got the upper hand, and before she knew what she was doing, she sank it into Aria's stomach. Ripped it out. Buried it. Again and again and again. Blood gushed out of the smaller woman, her eyes draining of awareness, and Spencer collapsed against her, continuing to stab even as she felt Aria go still beneath her.

She stopped only when she was certain that Aria, that A, was dead. She laid there, and tried to decide what to do next.

The adderall bottle was in her hands faster than she could control herself. She was coated to the wrist in blood, and the bottle almost slipped out of her hands as she unscrewed the cap and looked inside. It was enough.

The next hour had her sitting down to pen a full confession, glancing over as Aria's body continued to bleed out onto the bed. She filled a glass with tap water from the bathroom and started taking pills three at a time, until she had finally downed the whole bottle. They kicked in just as she was signing the note, with her beginning to shake so violently that she couldn't hold the pen. She looked over at Aria again–

And flinched.

Ants were crawling across her lover's face. And Ali stood beside her, a chunk of her skull missing. Spencer felt bile rising in her throat, and there was a sharp pain gradually growing stronger as it pierced her heart.

She couldn't breathe.

Somehow her legs moved her to the bed and she laid down in the blood and the ants and the muck. Alison stayed in the corner of her vision the whole time, until the last second, when she finally turned to look at Aria, still, even after everything, so desirable.

Like a drug.

-.-.-.-

_In the madness and soil_

_Of that sad, earthly scene_

_Only then I am human_

_Only then I am clean._

**Author's Note:**

> There you have it. Hope it made your skin crawl :)


End file.
